At Miami’s electric Formula E grand prix, high school students see engineering in action

For Santiago Zamudio, walking through the pit lane of a Formula E Miami E-Prix race and seeing mechanics assemble an electric race car piece by piece reminds him of what he does in his South Dade Senior High School classroom.

The sophomore is part of the Electrathon Team, an educational program in which students design, build and race electric-powered vehicles to learn sustainable engineering. Teams compete to see who can travel the farthest distance in one hour on a single, restricted battery charge.

On an overcast and drizzly day, more than 100 students got a behind-the-scenes tour of the mega operation set up at the Hard Rock Stadium ahead of the Miami E-Prix, part of an international championship featuring high-performance, open-wheel electric race cars with a focus on sustainability and innovation.

They got to witness practices, peek into garages, try out a race simulator and get career advice last Friday, ahead of the Saturday race at the Miami International Autodrome’s Miami Loop circuit, the venue’s official name for racing events.

“It is pretty similar by the way that we all work together to actually make the car come to life,” Zamudio told WLRN. “It’s also nice to see, like, the same teams here doing the same stuff that we do… which just makes it really exciting to also be part of the electrical team.”

Sporting a thick grey hoodie, Zamudio carried a digital camera with him to take photos of the garages where the cars, drivers and mechanics worked as one unit. His favorite electric race team, Nissan, was there. While he didn’t have the chance to meet someone from the team, he snagged a photo with Cupra Kiro Spanish driver Pepe Martí.

Southgate Senior High School is one of the nearly 30 schools Florida Power and Light, or FPL, sponsor Electrathon teams at. Students from teams at Miami-Dade County high schools were at the Friday tour.

“ We work with the schools for multiple years and then as the students graduate, many of them actually take this into their college life and race in college,” said FPL spokesperson Florencia Olivera, “and they many times come back and mentor, which is what we like about this program.”

The multi-year program fosters science, technology, engineering and math skills — or STEM — as well as critical thinking, problem solving, teamwork and creativity by providing a kit of the pieces needed to out together a fully electric go-kart: the motors, rims, seatbelts, mirrors and a battery. Then, piece by piece, build their masterpiece. Each kit is valued at about $10,000.

This is the second year FPL has partnered with offered students a special tour of the Formula E Miami E-Prix. Florida is the state with the fourth greatest number of clean energy jobs, according to U.S. Department of Energy.

“ It’s all about encouraging that creativity, encouraging ingenuity and ultimately that STEM and that path for them,” Olivera said, and “even working for FPL one day.”

The five participating schools at Friday’s tour — Hialeah Gardens High, South Dade Senior High, Miami Carol City High, Miami Lakes Educational Center and TERRA Environmental Research Institute — all have an Electrathon team sponsored by Florida FPL.

Enrique Martinez, a junior at Hialeah Garden Senior High school, noticed a difference in the sound of the electric cars zooming in practice and F1 cars.

“ The F1 cars are a little bit louder,” Martinez said. “In my opinion, I would say the Formula E cars sound a little bit cleaner [because of] the whole cleaner energy.”

Martinez has seen the car he’s put together reach high speeds. “ It felt very real even though it was just at a smaller scale,” he said.